Ramping multiple different Group Addresses

Hi all,

A client has recently asked us to control a number of different lighting groups from the one DLT/Saturn button, in sevaral instances throughout the home.

He wants to be able to control these groups in the same way one would control a single a single dimmable lighting group from a button. That is, a short press takes the outputs to 100% and a subsequent tap takes the output to 0%. A longer press to commence ramping up all these different groups together and a subsequent longer press to commence ramping downwards.

All the buttons on each switch are being used and there are too many different group addresses in each of these requested "combined" groups to manipulate the switch's "block" assignments, as each would need to occupy a button position (be it physical or virtual).

As I plan to incorporate a PACA or WISER, my plan was to create an ON scene and and an OFF scene for each of these "combined" groups and use logic to toggle between the two, via a dummy Group Address. The only shortcoming with this is is that we loose the ability to ramp these "combined" groups on longer presses.

My suspicion is that this is something we have to live with, without judiciously re-grouping the lighitng loads to more closely suit the clients request. That in itself brings other side effects that I would prefer not to re-visit.

Am I missing something here and is there another way to achive this without having to script a new operating system just to achieve this? Any realistic suggestions or advice would be most appreciated. Thank You.

 

Have a read in the logic help about the "track group" and "track group 2" commands.
Track group should do that nicely for you with very little effort.
You could try it out while running Piced if you have a network online.

 

Thanks DarylMc,

I must admit, I wasn't aware of this little nugget. It's a beauty!!

However, this then poses another dilemma, in that if the TrackGroup procedure is used so that Group2 tracks Groups1, then Group2 looses it's independence. That is, Group2 will always follow the state of Group1 to the extent that even if Group2 is controlled independently, the logic will soon change it back to the current state of Group1 (?).

I also foresee the TrackGroup2 procedure causing similar issues, in this case, in that if there are another 6 groups "tracked" together, changing Group2 will necessarily go and change the remaing groups being tracked, as well. This is not what the client needs, in this case.

Ideally, I'm looking for a solution whereby a nominated button can control a number of groups but each of those independent groups retain their ability to be changed individually, from other 1:1 button associations, around the home.

Does that make sense, or am I tying myself in knots here...??

 

Gee you are hard to please
I'm not sure how you would then make the lights independant.

 

Perhaps if the scene key enables the module and the other remote key disables it.
I'm sure someone will be able to add a few more ideas.

 

HasChanged

Try this other little Nugget, the HasChanged funtion, if you wrap you track groups up in the "If HasChanged then" structure available in the wonderfull right click menu then it will only track once the master group changes.

Here is some code using groups from the "HOME" example project

if HasChanged(GetLightingLevel("Bedside 1")) then
begin
TrackGroup("Local Network", "Lighting", "Bedside 1", "Bedside 2");
TrackGroup("Local Network", "Lighting", "Bedside 1", "Bed 1 Light");
TrackGroup("Local Network", "Lighting", "Bedside 1", "Bed 2 Light");
end;


the main thing to be careful off when tracking groups is that if the group is constantly changing you can cause run time errors by sending to many c-bus comands every loop.

 

Thanks Spooky,

I think you may have something here. The only issue that comes to mind (without testing) is that ramping of the group memebers won't be smooth but "staged" instead, the refresh level frequency off which would be dependent upon the execution cycle within the PAC. Would that be correct? Nevertheless, it does still do the job and warrants further testing.

I'll try a few more test and report back. Thanks again.

 

Thanks Spooky
That should come in handy for me too.

 

Success on the test rig...!!

Baring in mind that I'm only testing with 2 group adresses, I hope it works as well with around 5-6.

Thanks again, Spooky.